


for these fickle feelings (there is no antidote)

by damselindisguise



Category: Arrow (TV 2012), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Five Stages of Grief, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Season/Series 05 Finale, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-21
Updated: 2019-10-21
Packaged: 2020-12-27 09:22:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21116444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damselindisguise/pseuds/damselindisguise
Summary: A hate that strong can only grow from a feeling just as strong. Adrian's going to have to come to learn that, before all of this is over. Maybe Oliver will, too.Or, five steps to change everything.





	for these fickle feelings (there is no antidote)

**Author's Note:**

> ((A/N: This sprang to mind as a crack-ship kind of thing, and then... took on a life of its own. It's not beta-read, so there might be errors, but enjoy! The only warnings are that Adrian's attempted suicide is discussed multiple times, and the characters are shown in the throes of grief and act self-destructive.))

1\. 

Denial.

The island is still smoldering when Oliver, William, and the barely-breathing Adrian Chase leave it behind, boat chugging along to leave it as just part of the horizons of their lives. It's cold, but Oliver reminds himself this won't be permanent. When he makes it back to Star City, he'll call Barry, and Barry will run back in time and fix all of this. He'll go back and make sure that the island doesn't explode, that Felicity and John and Samantha and everyone else survive. 

The island is probably long cool when Oliver, William, and the mostly-stable Adrian Chase arrive back to Star City, plane settling into place on the runway only moments before the vigilante's son is running off of it and onto the tarmac. He's panting roughly by the time Oliver catches up, like his breath is catching on something like a lump in his throat, and he's got tears in his eyes.

"I don't want to be around him anymore," William says, and Oliver understands that. He doesn't want to be around Adrian Chase anymore, either– if he could help it, he would never be around Adrian Chase again in his life, but the other man is probably going to make the process of recovering and then making it through a trial a living hell for the mayor, if he has anything to say about it, given their track record. 

"I know," Oliver says, instead of telling William all of that. He hugs his son close, and he brushes his fingers through the boy's hair until he stops shaking in his father's arms, until he's calm again and ready to keep moving down the runway. 

The mayor is met with a greeting party of dozens of reporters, a cadre of bodyguards, and a sea of citizens beyond them, but he keeps William by his side through it all. By the time they reach the car, he realizes he didn't look back to watch Adrian's unconscious body being offloaded from the plane, and there's a terrified seizing in his chest at the thought that the villain could have awoken and broken free of his frankly spare escort to escape.

"Can you call the escort, and make sure that Chase is in custody?" he asks one of the bodyguards quietly. At the question, the woman he's spoken to gestures, and Oliver follows the pointed finger to see the former DA's unconscious form being rolled, on a stretcher, to an ambulance with an armed escort.

"We're taking no chances," she assures him. "The city isn't going to let him get away that easily, Mayor Queen."

As far as Oliver is concerned, it doesn't actually matter. Soon enough, all of this will be erased completely, and he'll be able to breathe easy in a new timeline, knowing his friends and family are safe and sound and Chase is soundly defeated. All he needs to do is get through the next few hours, call Barry, and get the ball rolling on some time travel shenanigans. 

He plants a kiss on William's scalp and wraps his arm around his son. The boy is quiet as the driver gets going.

~

Oliver waits outside William's room while they check him in the hospital to make sure that he's not been harmed too badly in the events of the island battle. He's beginning to wonder what's taking so long when he sees them wheel Adrian Chase past, the villain now half-awake, groaning as he twists against the straps holding his chest and legs to the stretcher, flexing his wrists where their binding will stretch slightly. 

Seeing red, Oliver sets out after them. He waits a moment after they take the now-former Prometheus into a room and exit before making his own entrance, standing at the foot of the bed and staring down Adrian Chase for the first time since the man tried to commit suicide on the boat floating off the shores of Lian Yu.

"Oliver," rasps the shape under the gauze, one eye blinking, the white turned red with burst blood vessels. "Long time no see."

The vigilante isn't sure what to say. Yelling at Chase for having killed everyone but he and William will only make the villain feel like he won- and maybe he did, but not for long, Oliver reminds himself. Not for long.

"You know," Adrian says, and licks his lips dryly, "I thought I'd feel better, after I hurt you. I mean, really hurt you, not just physically. I was wrong, I guess, 'cause I feel exactly the same, besides this pounding headache. Thanks for saving my life by the way, Oliver."

"I didn't do it for you," Oliver bares his teeth, then, sure enough that he didn't really mean to save Adrian Chase's life that he can at least say that much. "I did it for myself. To prove I'm better than what you want me to believe I am. And for all of them, to live up to what they thought I was. To be better."

"So, which is it?" Adrian wonders, hoarse. "Are you better than what I believe you are, or are you just trying to be better? Those are contradictory statements... mister Mayor."

"Are they really so different?" Oliver snorts. "I'm not debating morality with you any more, Adrian. I'm done. You're done. There's going to be a court case, and this is all going to end. You're going to go away forever, and William and I are going to live long, happy lives without you ever laying a finger on us again. So, think about that while you lay there and stew in your hospital bed. I've got better things to do than talk to you."

The vigilante turns on his heel to leave, striding towards the door and reaching for the handle to pull it open. He halts when he hears a faint laughter emerging from the former DA where he lies.

"What?" he bares his teeth after a moment, unable to abide the mirthful sound emerging from his enemy.

"It's just," Adrian laughs, almost uproarious now, "you don't know! You really thought Samantha didn't have someone lined up for if something happened to her?! Someone other than you?!" He dissolves into mad cackling at that, sounding like he belongs moreover in Gotham than in Star City General. Oliver's blood runs cold, and he wrenches the door open, hurrying out and down the hallway to where he left William, in the room with the doctors. 

There's a woman standing outside the room, short and wide. She looks kind, and she's holding a thin file with a few sheets of paper inside. When she sees Oliver, she takes on an expression middling between sympathetic and stony. 

It's time to face the music, he supposes. He's already lost everything, and now he's going to lose his son, too- but not for long, he tells himself. Only long enough for him to set something up with Barry, something with time travel that will fix all of this and turn it into a nightmare he's never even had.

So, he walks towards her, takes a deep breath, and goes on autopilot.

2.

Anger.

The world is shattered glass that only cuts Oliver when he tries to pick it up. He's already up to his ears in grief, so when he calls STAR Labs and they tell him Barry locked himself away in the Speed Force, and the Flash is no more as a result, he just quietly and unobtrusively hangs up the phone before throwing it against the wall and watching it break into a hundred pieces. He paces over and stares at it, stomps a few times on the screen for good measure before walking to the door, grabbing his jacket, and exiting the loft.

He heads the only place he knows to go- the Arrowcave, where he sits down and stares at the empty spaces where his team, his friends- his family- should be. He can almost hear them now, can almost imagine it, how they'd all be getting back to normal already, compartmentalizing the island and moving on with their lives. He and William might have a relationship, might talk on the phone, because Samantha would probably allow it after he and the team had saved both of their lives from Chase and his men.

Instead, Oliver failed. Instead, he's alone, utterly so, and doesn't know if he'll ever be allowed to speak to his son again after all that's come to pass.

He doesn't feel comforted by the cave. It feels like a void. It feels like there's a hole where every single member of the team should be, and a hole in Oliver bigger than he even is. It should be impossible, but it feels massive, like despite his being only a man, he has created something that could swallow the world whole and make all of the sacrifices in vain just because he's lost so much.

"Dammit," he says, scrubs his face with his palms, and digs the tips of his fingers into the corners of his eyes as if there's any sleep to clean out of them. There's not. He hasn't slept. Exhausted as he's ever been, maybe more, he wraps himself in his leathers, plucks the string of his weapon with his gloved fingers, and then heads out into the streets. He loses himself in the snarl, the grimace, the bellowing modulated voice, and blows arrows clean through criminals until the small hours of the morning. 

The burning in his core doesn't feel any better. His abdomen is as tight as his shoulders, and the hateful feeling boils his blood until he sweats, clammy, under the suit, slicking the leather with perspiration. He keeps going until he can't anymore, and then he gets on his bike and rides back to the Arrowcave like his life depends on the speed he achieves- like the lives he's lost depend on it, like maybe he's Barry Allen and can cascade through time and bring everyone back again. Of course, he can't, so he just parks in the garage and leans over the handlebars, breathing wetly in and out over and over again. 

He leaves the Green Arrow suit in the case, leaves the bow on its mount. He's got nothing to give tonight, no offerings to the abstract concept of vigilante justice in an effort to wash the city clean of the taint of crime. All he's got is this misery.

Oliver leaves the Arrowcave behind and returns to the loft, spinning his wheels aimlessly. He walks in and turns on the television, flipping to the news, where they've got a breaking news bulletin shining in banners across the screen. He stops and watches.

"We regret to inform you that tonight, former District Attorney Adrian Chase, exposed as the Throwing Star Killer, has escaped custody at the hospital. No one was harmed, but police have issued a public service announcement asking for citizens to keep their doors and windows locked and keep an eye out for anything suspicious until Chase is once more apprehended, as he is considered extremely dangerous whether armed or not."

Just like that, he can feel his anger go out like a light. What remained of it, glowing in the void of his despair, blinks out, and hopelessness overtakes him, cold and unfeeling as he settles into place on the couch and his fingers twitch.

~

Oliver wakes up a few hours later and returns to the 'cave, trying to track Adrian's position in the city. He's coming up empty when the elevator doors slide open and out comes the very man that the vigilante is on the hunt for, stumping his way into the cave on hospital slippers stained black from the Star City streets and carrying a half-full bag of greasy Big Belly Burger.

"Figured you'd be hungry," Chase says neutrally, as he ascends the steps onto the platform in the middle of the Arrowcave, halting facing an aghast, agape Oliver Queen. "Figured you wouldn't be eating, if I know you. And I know you better than anyone knows you, so. I brought us both Big Belly Burger, and got all of both of our favorites, since this might be my last meal on the face of the planet."

"What makes you think I'm going to let you live long enough to eat anything?" Oliver bares his teeth, his voice almost guttural in his rage.

"Well, I figured I'd appeal to your better angels," Adrian says, "since it seems you must have some of those, after all, saving my life and what not. It doesn't matter, though. I came here so you could kill me. I won. What else is there left to do but die to you?"

Oliver takes the Big Belly Burger, opens the bag, and starts pulling out sandwiches and french fry boxes. There are packets of sauce and napkins, too. He sets those on the desk, where Felicity once sat, and spreads the food out on the floor in a half-moon before sliding out of the chair and sitting on one side, across the middle of the platform from Adrian. 

"Go on," he gestures, his voice taut and his movements stiff as he gestures for the former villain to sit on the other side. "Sit down. You went to all the trouble of getting this when there's a city-wide manhunt on for you, you deserve it."

"Kill me after?" Adrian asks, and doesn't wait for an answer before he sits down and starts eating.

Oliver takes an experimental bite of the first burger to his right, something that Rene had sworn by and Oliver had thought was disgusting. The three patties mush together as he chews, and he takes a second bite. He doesn't feel any better, but he also doesn't feel any worse, and, right now, that's about as much as he can ask for, so he decides that he's going to eat the food and see what happens before he makes any more decisions beyond that.

Maybe, just maybe, Adrian poisoned the food. Oliver doesn't check, but Adrian doesn't seem all that worried about doing anything further to him, now, so he's not sure that it's even necessary, at this point. 

They've both given up, all their anger dissipating.

3.

Bargaining.

"Well," Adrian says, when they're done, clapping his hands and adjusting, but remaining sitting, cross-legged, on the backlit floors of the Arrowcave. "I guess it's time, then. You going to get your bow, mister Mayor?"

Oliver sighs, snorts, and shakes his head. He finds himself chuckling a moment later, and meeting the eyes of a bewildered former villain when he's done with his laughing fit that follows. 

"No," he says, taking a few deep breaths to steady himself. "No, Adrian, I'm not going to kill you. I just ate something like ten patties, I'm not doing anything right now but sitting here and waiting until I feel about a mile better. After that, I'm going to go home and go to sleep. You can do whatever you want, but I'm not getting my bow, and I'm certainly not going to kill you, either."

"You're being uncharacteristically forgiving," Adrian says dryly. "What happened to you liking it? All those confessions you made to me, back when you were mine?"

"Yours," Oliver says, short, dry. "You have quite the high opinion of yourself, Adrian. You know that?"

"Well, it comes with the territory," the former Prometheus opens his arms, gesturing at himself generally. "I'm an egotistical maniac who believes I can do no wrong in my quest to bring your world crashing down, up to and including murdering my own wife and pinning it on your alter ego. Can you blame me?"

"Well, yeah," the vigilante says.

"I figured," Adrian lets his arms drop back to his sides. He stares at Oliver for a few minutes, and eventually the vigilante decides he feels better enough to move, and pushes himself to his feet with a hand on the edge of the desk. He finds his footing and walks to the case to stare at his suit, standing there and staring back at him with that void where his face would be if he were wearing it. The smooth silver mannequin underneath offers him no insight as to why he's letting Adrian Chase live after everything he's done, but he thinks that maybe if Felicity were here she would say something patronizing and caring about his being soft before she would hug his arm and smile at him. Dig would shake his head and give that funny half-smile and agree with her, but they'd both be so secretly proud of him that it wouldn't really be a secret at all.

"I'm not going to kill you, Adrian," Oliver says, voice unendingly sad in the soft way he speaks, his eyebrows flat above his gaze as he turns to look at the other man after the statement before continuing. "I'm not doing it to spite you, or because I don't want to. I'm doing it because it's what they would have wanted. They wouldn't want me to let the darkness consume me, just because they're gone."

Adrian Chase stares at Oliver Queen, and now it's his turn to sit there, aghast and agape, before he snaps his mouth shut and his eyes turn to steel.

"I don't believe you," he says sharply.

"You don't need to," Oliver says, and then, as Adrian sits there, legs crossed underneath him and palms planted solidly against the glowing floor of the Arrowcave's central platform, exits into the elevator and shuts the doors to it as unobtrusively as possible, leaving perhaps his worst enemy, and the only person who knows him left in the world, alone- just as alone as himself.

~

Later, after a few days pass, Oliver gets a call that one of his properties- the Arrowcave's property- has burned. He tells them to let it go. He'll have it renovated later, and return to his duties there then. He can operate from home until then, if anything necessitates his attention.

Meanwhile, Adrian roams the city under guise of night, feeling pettily vindictive and utterly confused at Oliver Queen's refusal to end his life after what he's done to him. He set fire to the building above the Arrowcave out of a momentary whim, and hadn't felt especially powerful watching it burn before he had left to avoid being caught by the firefighters and the police who would inevitably follow after them. 

He exchanges stained hospital slippers that shush against the sidewalk and stick to the tile in abandoned buildings with grime for discarded running shoes, the color washed out by overuse and the shoestrings frayed at the ends. He loses the clothes he steals time and again as they become filthy, swapping them for something more presentable that will keep him blending in among the homeless population of Star City at the same time. 

Most of all, he keeps tabs on Mayor Queen's life. Oliver continues his routine as normal, if slightly altered, after the events of the island. He barely goes out as the Green Arrow, and mostly spends short, sporadic hours in the Mayor's office during the day. Other than that, he stays at home, eating Big Belly Burger often and watching the news even more often, as if he's got nothing better to do. 

That frustrates Adrian. It almost makes him wish for the hate to return in its full force, but he can't feel it anymore. He's won, and he's got no reason to continue on with that path anymore, so, to his surprise, it dulls, until he pities the man he spends all of his time shadowing- which Oliver, by the way, must be aware of, given that he is who he is, and is no fool to boot. Why the vigilante tolerates being effectively stalked by the man who blew up Lian Yu and killed his friends and family, Adrian isn't sure, but he doesn't particularly want to confront the other man to ask, either, so he lets it go.

He hates Oliver for other reasons, now, like for being a useless bum who barely does anything but eat, work, and watch the news. He loathes the new, disproved Oliver Queen who doesn't take it upon himself to go out in the streets as the Green Arrow, and he's not sure how to solve that particularly conundrum, because he never liked the Green Arrow any at all, so why would it bother him to see the guy gone?

Finally, he returns to the Arrowcave. Oliver, that is- Adrian does, too, but hours later, and he scales the sides of the elevator shaft effortlessly to descend until he finds his way through the rubble to the buried lair and wriggles his way into the space. The power is out, so he digs out a flashlight from one of his deep pockets, edging past stolen cash and grimy napkins until he's got it, and then he pins it between his teeth and lets it glow as he scans the area.

Oliver is not present. Good, Adrian didn't want to see him anyway. He's focused on finding out if the Mayor will finally go back to being a vigilante for real, instead of acting like his heart is no longer in it. 

The Green Arrow suit has been abandoned in its case, and he stops short at the sight before angrily grabbing a stone and pitching it through the glass. It shatters across the floor, leaving jagged sharp edges behind in the shell surrounding the green leathers. Adrian finds that's not enough, so he stalks over and grabs the mannequin, pitching it to the floor and beginning to kick it. He kicks until he can't anymore, hunched over and glaring at the verdant costume, rumpled and confused in shape around the now misshapen dummy that it sets on. 

Then, it fairly clicks into place for Adrian. At long last, he thinks he might understand, staring at the costume and thinking about all of his encounters with Oliver Queen, the frustrating playboy with a heart of tarnished gold that refuses to kill him and seems to be perfectly okay with living a life of depressed, lonely monotony, like he's given up on trying to fix anything at all and is prepared to just wallow in his pain. 

A hate that strong can only grow from a feeling just as strong. Adrian's going to have to come to learn that, before all of this is over. Maybe Oliver will, too. 

Adrian steals the Green Arrow costume. He suddenly, pettily, wants Oliver to know. He puts it on and runs, leaving the Arrowcave dim and empty of all signs in his wake.

4.

Depression.

Months pass after the Green Arrow costume is stolen from the 'cave before the other shoe drops. Frankly, Oliver expected it to happen sooner; someone had stolen the suit, and he was sure that they would use it once they had it, for whatever ill-gotten gains they wanted. He was sure that even if they used to to work as a vigilante, like he had, they would be ineffectual, and leave the name in disgrace as they died in the damned thing. He was okay with that, if not the part about someone dying because of him, again.

Instead, the suit reappears standing on his balcony a long while after it goes missing, and he flinches sharply at the sight of it, emerging from his bedroom in his undershorts at something like three in the morning to get a glass of water when he sights the dark shape looming outside the glass of the loft, beyond the parted slats of the blinds.

There's a person wearing it, not a mannequin like it had been the last time he'd seen it, and in the place of that silver void of a face, reflecting back memories and thoughts at him like so much swimming in his own eyes, he recognizes that person. 

It's Adrian Chase, a keen, hard frown etched into his features among a scrape of dark whiskers forming a beard on his face, ascending towards a head of hair edging towards being able to be called a mop, curls of it falling at either side of the former villain's forehead. His eyes are stormy blue spots blown black by his pupils in the dark. Oliver blinks, steadying himself, and switches on the kitchen light, throwing a reflection of the loft against the glass.

He takes his time, testing Adrian. He pours his glass of water and takes a sip. He sets it down on the counter with a clatter of glass on marble. He walks to the bathroom door to retrieve a robe and wrap it around himself, tying it only loosely at his front. He only then goes to the balcony door and tugs the blinds to the side, unlatching the door and opening it confidently.

If Adrian has come to kill him, so be it. He's not interested in fighting the former Prometheus any more- ever again.

"Oliver," Adrian says, voice somewhere between soft and hoarse as he speaks. The former vigilante's name sounds like a threat and a question when it lands on his ears, and he steps back from the open door to return to his water, picking up the glass and taking another drink. His former enemy enters the apartment and looks at the door he's just come through like it's a foreign object before closing it behind himself and throwing the lock again. He's got a bow, but he sets it on the couch.

"Not here to kill me?" Oliver asks, at that.

"No," Adrian says, flatly. He gives Oliver that same look he gave the door, eyebrows low and eyes dimly guarded all the while. His frown doesn't shift, but he walks over to the counter and sits down uncertainly on one of the bar stools.

"You want something to drink?" Oliver asks, his body feeling terse at the return of Adrian Chase. His eyes feel hot and wet. He's not sure what that's about, because he hasn't cried about losing his family in months, but he's not about to let himself cry in front of Adrian if he can help it- and he definitely can help it.

"Water," Adrian answers, after a pause. The former vigilante nods, turns, and gets a glass from the cabinet, opening up the tap again to fill the receptacle before turning off the sink, edging back around, and placing the drink in front of the former villain.

They both drink. They are silent until Oliver's water is gone, and then Adrian speaks again, like he's been polite waiting for the Mayor to finish his glass before he obtruded again.

"Why did you quit?"

Oliver sets his glass down and purses his lips, staring at Adrian and weighing the question. It's heavy, loaded with all the different ideas that the former Prometheus has obviously had regarding the decision from his one-time quarry. 

"Why did you?" he finally settles on an answer. It's fair; Adrian did quit, too, just after a more significant victory than the one Oliver had had in refusing to kill him back in the Arrowcave, months ago. If he quit his crusade to ruin Oliver Queen, it's only obvious that he would understand why Oliver himself would quit his own crusade in kind. They understand each other, evidently, because Adrian just shrugs, nods, and finishes his water.

They are, perhaps, the only person in the world who might understand the other the way that they do. Oliver is just as certain now as he was then, in the 'cave, that Adrian is the last person on the world that truly knows him. He's more certain now, in fact, than that night with the Big Belly Burger on the floor.

"You can crash on the couch," Oliver takes mercy on his unannounced guest. "I'll see you in the morning. I'm tired."

~

Oliver nor Adrian wake up dead, which they both take, knowing the other feels much the same way, as a good sign for what's to come. They don't expect much, either, in kind, but they are glad that, at the very least, that part of the past- the trying to kill each other part- is behind them.

Adrian watches Oliver walk into the kitchen in a pair of undershorts and a robe after listening to him shower. He's got the waist tied loosely again, as if Adrian doesn't already know what he looks like underneath. As if he doesn't remember firing arrows into his already scarred body, as if he doesn't remember burning the tattoo from his skin, as if. Adrian remembers all of it, and it doesn't make him feel anything anymore like it used to. 

"The shower's ready for you," Oliver says, not unkindly, from the counter, with his eyes turned down towards something he's chopping up. Adrian knows the Mayor could throw the knife and kill him in an instant if he so pleased, with how he's laying with his arms tucked behind his head, unprepared, on the couch. "You seem like you could use it."

The former villain supposes that's true, but he asks, "Do you let everyone who walks in off the streets use your shower?"

"Only friends," Oliver says, with a forced lightness lilting his tone. "Susan Williams, for example. She's a friend."

"Only a friend?" Adrian mocks him, as he stands, stretching and popping his back.

"Well, we have a shared history, but other than that... we're just friends," Oliver says. "I'm making breakfast. I figured you'd be hungry. I figured you wouldn't be eating enough, if I know you- and I know you, better than anyone knows you, so, I'm making us both breakfast, and you've got no say in it, since this might be the last time we see each other."

"Why would it be the last time we ever see each other?" Adrian asks, immediately on the defensive, feeling like he needs to drop into position and everything- put up his dukes, prepare to nock an arrow.

"I was just guessing that once you got the answer you were looking for, about me quitting, you'd be done with me," Oliver says, and his voice is wobbly when he does. 

"You might not know me as well as you think you do," Adrian answers, gravelly, and heads through the bedroom to the bathroom, resolutely refusing to stop and examine the room as he goes in and walks across the tile to the shower stall. He twists the knob to turn on the water, kicks the door shut behind himself, and starts shedding the Green Arrow garb. He folds it and lays it across the back of the toilet before he steps under the hot spray. 

It's too hot, but he ignores that. He watches steam curl around his toes and lets the water drip from his sopping wet hair and run through the whiskers of his beard and flatten the hair on his chest against his skin. He raises his arms and runs shampoo and conditioner through the dark strands on his scalp until it feels clean and smooth, and then does the same to his beard. He washes his face and then goes to work on his body, scrubbing himself thoroughly with his palms. He feels too strange to steal Oliver's shower sponge to use on himself, despite knowing it would be in character for him.

By the time he gets out, the water is getting cold and the food is on the plates, Oliver politely waiting with folded hands over his meal until Adrian is seated to begin.

"This looks good," Adrian says stiffly, experimentally. "Thank you."

Oliver stares at him like he's just sprouted a second head before shaking his own and digging into his omelette more thoroughly. Adrian decides to close his mouth for now and gets eating as well, appreciating the home-cooked meal. It's the first true one he's had in months.

Before he can speak again, Oliver does.

"You can stay as long as you need to," the Mayor says, "but I need to go to work. I'll be back later. Don't feel obligated to be here, but don't feel like you shouldn't be."

With that, Oliver leaves, and Adrian decides he'll finish his omelette before he makes any more decisions. When he does that, maybe he'll have better ideas.

5.

Acceptance.

Oliver, true to his word, returns. He also does not bring a police escort with him, which Adrian counts as a plus as he watches the former vigilante walk in and hang up his suit jacket.

"You're still here," the Mayor says neutrally. Adrian doesn't respond, not seeing a reason to when it's only an observation stating the obvious. 

"I'm hungry," he says, instead, barbed.

"You could have ordered yourself a pizza," Oliver points out, walking to the fridge. "Or cooked something."

Adrian stares at the former Green Arrow's back as he leans into the freezer to search for something to warm up. The fabric of his thin button-down goes flat against the expanse, until the edge of every muscle there is defined through the baby blue color. When he realizes Oliver is turning around, he looks away and adjusts the Green Arrow tunic.

"Go get a change of clothes from my closet," Oliver snaps, sudden. "I don't want to sit here staring at you wearing that when there's perfectly good outfits you could wear instead."

Adrian doesn't have any response to that, his tongue tied in a knot for some reason that feels like when he stole something from a girl he liked in elementary school to try to prove a point. He gets up and goes in Oliver's room, once again not taking in anything in, keeping his eyes on his boots until he reaches the closet and opens it. He blindly grabs the first two garments he touches- a black tee-shirt and grey sweatpants. He removes the Green Arrow suit and puts on Oliver's clothes instead, padding barefoot back into the kitchen and standing there as if to present himself to the Mayor.

"Thank you," Oliver says flatly.

"You're welcome," Adrian grunts, finding his voice again.

Oliver finishes dinner as Adrian sits on the same stool as the night before, watching. He plates the food and sets one dish before Adrian, on the bar, and one before himself, leaning on the counter across from the former Prometheus. They both dig in in silence, but it doesn't feel stuffy, only vaguely uncertain.

"Adrian," Oliver says, suddenly, when he's toying with running the last bite of his protein through the sauce it had been doused in, "why are you here? I thought you hated me. What reason do you have to be here?"

Adrian weighs the words and decides to be honest before he can convince himself of anything else. "I realized you're the only person I know the way I know you, and the only person I feel as strongly about as I do. And I know that the same is true for you, so here I am."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Oliver laughs, tremulous, and its so obviously a lie that Adrian actually cracks a smile, showing his teeth and shaking his head when he's done with that.

"Oliver," he says, "there's some saying about hate coming from a place of love. I don't know. Can't you get the goddamn hint?"

"I never thought I'd hear you admit to not knowing," Oliver says. "What happened to being ten steps ahead, Adrian?"

"I'm always ten steps ahead of you," Adrian says, tilting his head, "and you still haven't figured out what game we're playing yet. So I think I can afford not to know, just this once."

"I think I'm catching up," Oliver says, and keeps their gazes steady on one another, "considering I've definitely figured out what game we're playing, this time."

"This time?"

"You don't expect me to believe you were in love with me when you were trying to kill me."

Adrian laughs, suddenly uncomfortable. "Who ever said I was in love with you?" He pushes back from the counter and walks to the sink with his plate, turning on the water and letting it rinse away the excess sauce and flecks of food. He turns on the garbage disposal and listens to it rumble in the basin. Oliver reaches over, setting his dish in the sink before turning the tap and the disposal off alike.

"You did," Oliver says, and before Adrian can argue with him, the former vigilante is kissing his former enemy- or maybe the other way around, because Adrian gets the feeling they'll argue about who kissed who for a long time after this. Either way, they're kissing, mouths meshed together as Oliver's hands find Adrian's face, brushing audibly across the beard he wears. The latter raises his hands and pushes Oliver's away, cups his cheeks, and draws him in closer, drinking him deeply. Oliver sets his hands on Adrian's sides instead, then. It's an okay compromise, and they stand like that for a moment before moving.

This time, Adrian takes in Oliver's room, frowning at the bedspread.

"Green? Really, mister Mayor?" he asks, voice husky. 

"Oliver," the former Green Arrow insists. "And, old habits die hard."

"Let's hope not too hard," Adrian hums, "or we're really in for it."

"Well, I think we'll be okay," Oliver chuckles, and kisses Adrian again. This time, he's definitely the one who kisses first. Adrian's okay with that. He just kisses back, pushing Oliver's shirt over his head to reveal a torso he knows every inch of already, and reaches for his own.

Oliver's never seen him like this before. For them, this is new ground; for knowing each other better than anyone else knows them, this is one thing they don't. That's okay, Adrian thinks; he's okay with learning. Learning things about Oliver Queen has been his life for so long he's not sure that he's okay with doing anything else ever again, and he hopes that Oliver feels the same way. Maybe he'll get that wish, judging by the way the other man is brushing his hands across Adrian's chest, callouses shushing against thickly dusted hair and skin. He runs his hands lower and grips Adrian's waistband.

"You're thinking too much," Oliver mumbles. "Quit it. You don't need to be ten steps ahead."

He supposes Oliver is right. Ten steps ahead might make this dance a little awkward. "But it's part of my charm," he protests anyway, with a razor sharp smile.

+

After.

Adrian uses Oliver's sponge in the shower, and Oliver just frowns at him.

"Take the suit back to the 'cave," he tells Adrian, and presses a single, chaste kiss against his lips before finishing, "and get your own sponge while you're at it."

**Author's Note:**

> ((A/N: God help me, I'm invested. How did this happen to me? Anyway, if you like this one shot, let me know! Maybe I'll write more if it turns out I'm not the only one invested in this... somehow...))


End file.
